[0:00]
This is our church, the Lakes Evangelical Church. We don't meet in the ocean, but we're just 20 minutes up the road. So what I'm going to do, where a daughter church of EV, and so I want to tell you our story and draw some lessons along the way for what we've learnt. And then I've also can vest about a dozen other people in mother-daughter church relationships. I've pulled together a whole lot of

[0:30]
advice from a range of people that I'll hand out to you at the end because you'll have my perspective. But then I'll also get a whole lot of other ideas from other people. We'll be able to sort of field questions and see where it goes. So hopefully it'll be helpful. So to start with, just flick up down on this, this is the central coast. So the central coast, basically you start down the Hawksbury, Brisbane Water. This is the Tugra Lakes Lake system. And then you go, you go up to Nora Head and all that up the top.

[1:12]
So 17, 18 years ago EV began on the central coast and they started in the heartland of the central coast. Now it doesn't look like the heartland geographically, but in terms of people, it really is at the heart. It used to be that Gospherd was the centre of the central coast, but over time it's shifted towards the beach. And so now, Aaron, you can really get a sense of that from, you look at the local shopping centres and you really get a sense of the epicenter of an area. I think Westfield and so on are much better market researchers than we are in terms of working out. Where are the people? What are the points of attraction and so on?

[1:54]
So I don't think it's any accident that one of the biggest churches in Australia in terms of our evangelical scene is planted next door to one of the biggest shopping centres in the region. It's a massive shopping centre. So that was 18 years ago. I knew Andrew, this is Mother of Daughter. So I knew Andrew from way back when he was an MTS worker and I was a first-year civil engineer and we sort of forged a ministry relationship from way back then.

[2:28]
And we've been involved in ministry ever since, running sailing camps and leading camps and we've just kept in contact over the years. And so when I was at college, at Bible College, I had a real heart to start a church outside of the Sydney area. I'd grown up feeling like I hadn't been well taught in the Bible and I hadn't been part of a church that was really well taught. I had a real heart to get out there somewhere where there was a need for that sort of ministry. And we were thinking of all sorts of options. But in the end, we landed here on the central coast partly because of my connection with Andrew,

[3:15]
and Andrew heard partly because my parents already lived up here and so we knew a lot about the area. So there's a number of factors. So we had two sort of places we could have gone. Click on there in the next one. So basically when you think about the central coast, it's sort of, there's a few obvious population clusters, one down here at Woi Woi. You've got the centre, Aaron or and so on. Further north in the Berkeley Valley, by the entrance area and then further north up the Gaurikan area. And so we're sort of wrestling with where do you actually start?

[3:51]
In a sense, this area looked really attractive because it's the new growing area. So that's where the newer states are opening up and so on. But then on the downside of that was that there was hardly anyone from there traveling all that way down to EV. And so as we agonised over this, I got a piece of advice. We didn't go on much in those days. This is and so my single piece of advice was this. Have we got it there? All things being equal. Do whatever is easiest. Right. Now it was Philip Jensen said to me, all right, okay, well, that sounds all right.

[4:27]
And so the easiest thing was to go with the place that had a core group already. And so it was pretty obvious how I could gather a core group quite quickly. So we started off with at least 30 adults from EV who lived up that way. So Andrew said, you know, I'm not just going to send people to you, but you come along, state your case. And for those who live up that way who think, yeah, this we'd like to be part of a new work. They came and helped us start the lakes church. And we started in January of 2002.

[5:03]
So again, our church, we sort of had to wrestle with where do we start the church. And there's a compromise between where you'd want the church to be and where you can actually meet what facilities are there. But we're sort of we're in a high school auditorium. And we're quite close to another big Westfield sort of shopping center. And that seems like a really good arterial road that links the freeway to the coast.

[5:38]
Just click on the next thing. Just really helpful thinking about how church catchments work. And this is something that again, Philip Jensen helped me with quite a bit. And that is that when you think about, you know, he is the he is EV and he is the lakes. You sort of think about a catchment as being a circle or a radius around where you start your church. But the catchment is much more dependent on psychologically how people.

[6:12]
So you think about a circle with a radius around here. But catchments of churches work much more in terms of the gravitational pull like so you look at Sydney City. And if you plant at paramedic you won't get people coming from Ashfield equally as coming from Penrith. You're much more likely to have the outlying areas coming into you. But people don't travel out of the city.

[6:44]
And so that's pretty well was proved right in terms of the catchment that we had, which was basically everything close to us and further north with the people we picked up on. So in 2001, I gathered a core group and lots of them were from EV. But some of them, you know, were moving up at that time. They'd heard through the networks that we were starting.

[7:18]
And so we started to gather with this group. That was an exhausting time because I wasn't living here. I was living in Sydney and just traveling up once a month regionally. And then once a week. And as it got closer and closer, really quite taxing. I can remember, you know, having to stop halfway down the freeway a few times and having sleep before I set a ride home. You know, you kick off a church like this in an area that's not got a strong evangelical presence. So it certainly didn't, you know, 10 or 11 years ago.

[7:51]
Heaps of different theological backgrounds. So many people come to your church wanting to influence church and wanting to have a power role within church. And so those early days are hard work because you really got to hold most things to yourself. You know, you want to move to the matrix as soon as possible. But you realize, I don't know who I can trust here, who I can actually. But, you know, he is one of the benefits of having a core group from a church like EV is that you have a group who do share the DNA of, you know, evangelical, understood predestination, understood a philosophy of ministry that was quite similar.

[8:30]
And yeah, I just want to say I have loved planting a church. I find it really refreshing. I love that people choose to join our church rather than feel like this is the church I've always been to. I feel for my friends who are in churches that are established, like I understand you've got to do both. But I really feel for them because for some of them, they've got people in their churches who hate them or don't want them to join. Or don't want them there or don't like them. And they've just got to sell, you know, I've got people like that in our church as well. But in a sense, they've chosen to join. And they have to put up with it where I'm not the new player in the mix. Anyway, I like that about church planning.

[9:12]
Let me, let me start telling you what, what the seminars about. I'm not going to use that because I've got too many things I'm juggling it. So I wanted to talk about the relationship between the mother church and the daughter church. All along Andrew was really clear on expectations. So they were happy for me to come along and announce the church plant. And any of their members that wanted to come along and join us were welcome to do that.

[9:44]
And at the level of financial support, they would give some financial support. But again, Andrew was really clear. He said, if things don't go well, you've got to be prepared to mow lawns for a living. And that's a direct quote. So this is his conversation of trying to settle my nerves and all that sort of stuff. If things don't go well, you've got to be prepared to mow lawns for a living. And so, like at one level, that seems harsh. But I think it was really helpful to actually, there was no safety net here. Andrew is saying, you've actually got to make this thing work.

[10:19]
And if it doesn't work, you've got to deal with whatever consequences. If you have a heart to continue this ministry, well, you've got to work out a way of doing it. So he's saying, we're not going to be this endless backstop or safety net for you. As the daughter church, you feel very vulnerable in the relationship between mother and daughter church. For me, I think it was especially so because EV is this massive church with so much momentum.

[10:52]
And you really feel like you might be swamped by all of this. How can we possibly compete? And as the daughter church, again, it really hurts when you feel like you're starting to gather a core group. But then some of them are so critical to the mother church that the mother church says, hey, we really want you to stay. And so that whole thing of persuading people to come back to the mother church. That's hard going. And it's not long before this relationship between Andrew and myself, which has been fantastic. And it's a good relationship of mentoring for a number of years where you feel the strain.

[11:36]
And you just feel like we're now actually in competition for a common pool of resources. And about a year into our church, it really got bad for me because EV were looking for land at that time. And they were originally looking for a block of land about seven minutes towards our church, which cut the distance. It would have been somewhere around here, which cut the distance to about 10 minutes. And it was like, oh, come on. You're already a big enough presence here already. Let alone sort of creeping up the freeway, up the road our way.

[12:16]
And so you sort of, there's those sort of tensions. Some of the people who came with me really fostered and asked them relation sort of attitude. And generally that was flattering to me. And so you sort of, you know, it's not good, but at the same time you like to hear it. And that is, you know, this is the lakes is much more welcoming. I know people much better, people are much more hospitable. And all those things were true. We just lived in each other's houses for those early months.

[12:55]
And there was not a Sunday went by when you weren't invited to someone's place, you know, for lunch or whatever after church. But what, you know, what's the danger of that? What's the danger of that sort of attitude? Yeah, comfortable. The pride is one. But it's also because our goal is to grow. The danger is you don't create a church, which has built into it a sense of where we're a nice, tight family who are already in each other's, always in each other's houses.

[13:29]
The danger is it's going to mitigate against your growth down the track. So you just got to be careful about about that, even though it's kind of like what you want to hear. Some of the people who came with us were far more scathing than that. And actually part of their reason for leaving EV was because they hated Andrew to be honest. And so they came sewing seeds of a real, I suppose they'd been in a power play with Andrew here at EV. And they saw an opportunity to step out from under that and start afresh.

[14:08]
And it's a real danger because I already get I got this is mother daughter. Yeah, and you are very welcome here. No worries. It's a it's a danger because you're already feeling the tension. You know, I'm already feeling this tension between Andrew and I. I'm already feeling like there's a bit of a power play going on.

[14:38]
And so to have people coming along who are enforcing that message, you can start to believe it. And the divisive the potential for divisiveness is massive in those early years when when. Yeah, yeah.

[15:14]
Well, you had an idea with it. I'm probably not perfect in dealing with it. But I suppose I just I will deal with this in just a little while. But I suppose I try to keep keep being level head of the batter. I tried to keep pulling people up when they tried to do the comparisons. And in terms of that people who are really anti Andrew, I think for a couple of them, it actually took a number of years before they actually ended up leaving the church.

[15:47]
But I think they had more influence than they probably gave them more influence than I ought to have. And so it's yes. I don't think I dealt with it perfectly, but it's something to be aware of and it's a danger. Yeah. So some people, some people who came, we're still grieving the mother church and some of the benefits of the mother church. So you, it cuts both ways where there's a feeling like, oh, there's no youth group here. What am I going to do with my teenage kids? And the children's ministry is just not as good.

[16:25]
There's no seniors ministry really. And so, yeah, I think that sense of comparison cuts both ways. But either way, you've got to try to help people see a bigger, a bigger gospel vision. And this is where I want, I want you to open your Bible as if you got one. Philippians chapter two.

[16:58]
So Philippians one just just listen as Paul describes just the battle of ambition amongst his co-workers. Now I want you to know brothers and sisters that what has happened to me is actually served to advance the gospel. He's now in prison as he writes is. As a result, it's become clear. Throughout the whole palace guard and to everyone else that I'm in change for Christ. And because of my chains, most of the brothers and sisters have become confident in the Lord and dare all the more to proclaim the gospel without fear.

[17:32]
It's true that some preach Christ out of envy and rivalry, but others out of goodwill, the latter do so out of love knowing that I'm put here for the defense of the gospel, the former preach Christ out of selfish ambition, not sincerely supposing that they can stir up trouble for me while I'm in chains. But what does it matter? The important thing is that in every way, whether from false motives or true, Christ is preached and because of this I rejoice. Now if you've read and reflected on that passage, you get blown away by Paul's gospel-heartedness, don't you?

[18:12]
Like it really is extraordinary that he can see people preaching the gospel out of selfish ambition and yet he can still rejoice that Christ is preached. I find that extraordinary. And I reckon each of us needs to be very honest with ourselves that we each carry around a mixture of motives. And so we will carry around motives to advance the kingdom, godly motives. We want Christ to be glorified in all the earth, we want people to come into his kingdom and we have gospel ambition.

[18:53]
And that's a good thing. But then we also carry around selfish ambition and that is the sense of my own personal reputation and pride and my, something of my person is tied up in this work and it's success or failure in the eyes of others really has quite a bearing on me. And so we have this mixture of motives amongst us between godly ambition and selfish ambition. What are you meant to do with that?

[19:27]
Now Paul says the important thing is that Christ is preached and I think that's really helpful for us. That is we've got to recognize that we will have a mixture of motives but that ought not to stop us doing the work of the gospel. Because no one would be doing it right if it was completely pure motives. So recognize that there's a mixture going on. Keep preaching Christ, keep building his church but keep refining your motives along the way.

[19:58]
And actually keep taking a good look at yourself. I reckon it's tempting to only notice selfish ambition in the other person whether it's the mother church pastor or the daughter church. It's easy to recognize selfish ambition in the other person and to look at yourself and see only godly ambition. And so what we're going to do is reverse our tendency at that point. Be quick to recognize selfish ambition in yourself and be slow to assume that the ambition you see in the other is necessarily selfish ambition.

[20:35]
It could well be gospel ambition and you're just not big enough to say it. So we just got to give it have a generous outlook on one another. We ought to look at Paul and his gospel hardens and recognize the important thing is that Christ is preached. I have to keep repenting of selfish ambition in ministry and ask God to give me a bigger ambition for his glory and his kingdom and so on. Now having talked about those tensions it feels like it's all bad but it's not all bad but there is a reality too. And I think it's a surprising thing because you go in with such healthy relationships and you think so optimistically but it's surprising the conflict and the sort of power play and the loss of trust that can happen through that especially through those first few years of the world.

[21:31]
I also want to reflect on what a great blessing it's been to be a daughter church. Right having EV down the road. It is daunting because you think wow how can we ever compete with that. And again that's a wrong way of thinking isn't I'm not trying to compete with that we're on about the same thing doing it in a different way. And we can constantly learn from them because they're actually doing the same thing we've done but they're 5, 10 years down the track and so it keeps on lifting our vision keeps on challenging us and we enjoy a wonderful sense of partnership in the gospel and we've got to keep fostering those things and remembering those things.

[22:18]
Up until now my focus has been on EV and the lakes but from the first year of our I want to talk about this third one Northern lakes is there. Northern lakes up there from the first year of our church we set a vision to plant a church north of us because we even considered starting there ourselves but we thought no when there needs to be a church up there. And it was a great celebration when that came off 2006 so four or five years into our church we sort of initiated this whole process of a core group starting to pray towards it looking for a pastor.

[22:57]
But planting the church you realize now is the mother church how much it costs and how much it probably costs EV although we weren't thinking in those sort of terms at that time but you realize as a mother church how much it costs there is real grief when committed members move on and you think about this you know you've got these people up here in the north they are committed they're already traveling at least 20 minutes down to us for church. They are on the whole on the committed end of the spectrum of our members in church we've invested a lot of time and energy into these guys and then they up and go and there's a real grief in terms of relationships and so on.

[23:45]
And I think the mother church feels it more than the daughter church because the mother church is left with the grief but you don't have a new start all you're doing is rebuilding whereas the daughter church you know they have the grief but they've got a new thing that they're involved in and in a sense that they're not dwelling on what they've lost he is just a new start. So I think it's costly for the mother church and you need to be very open-eyed about that you lose committed people you lose their money their gifts within church life and then also you're giving out money in terms of trying to support this new work so it will cost you being a mother church in this sort of relationship.

[24:38]
And it also had an impact on us in terms of the catchment of our church so earlier on I talked about the catchment of our ministry looking something like that once we start northern lakes the catchment looks something like that and I'm going to say it we really felt the impact of that you know we're in an area that's actually quite developed and it's not opening up new work.

[25:08]
So we felt the cost of even at the level of easy growth we knew that it was easy growth you know we were growing by 30% each year for quite a number of years we start northern lakes and all of a sudden the breaks are applied so we knew that that couldn't last forever we worked out by about 2050 we would have more people in our church than on the central coast if we continued to grow.

[25:38]
That's it. You know we knew it was unsustainable but it was there was an easiness to it because we were just drawing on such a large area and we were offering something unique to that quite large area so you know there's another cost but it's a no brainer isn't it because if you're thinking gospel growth and kingdom growth it's just such a no brainer to make that decision because you can't evangelize a region where you're in the middle of the church.

[26:08]
You're expecting people to travel 20 minutes or so especially young family you can't evangelize young families from 20 to 25 minutes away and so really obvious thing to do and we've just got to keep remembering that following Jesus by nature is costly and we've got to expect that those costs will be born in a whole lot of ways including church life. Take up your cross and follow me is a basic call of discipleship to Corinthians 8 your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus who though being poor though they've been rich gave himself and made himself nothing for your sakes he may he became poor so that you through his poverty might become rich and so it's that great exchange of costliness that we need to imitate and that's just the fundamental call on every Christian.

[27:03]
And if we're not modeling that as pastors and leaders then something has gone wrong I'm going to be prepared for costly decisions. Any questions comments up to that point? Yeah. Okay. Yep. No worries. I would ask you about the ongoing relationship between the two churches so I'm from many different things that happen.

[27:35]
In terms of ongoing relationship it's really really healthy. Personally the hardest area I find is youth ministry because the nature of youth ministry is a crowd attracts a crowd and once there's a big thing going on in one place it really does have a suck you know and pulls people from quite a broad area and parents are such these days that if their kids want to go to youth group I don't care where it is I'll just take the hit and get them there.

[28:23]
So we've I think we feel you know with such a huge and vibrant youth ministry there can be that feeling of this is the thing we just where we're just deal with it we just keep on chipping away and so that's the area where we feel it more than any I think but we've got a really great relationship you know our churches with northern lakes as well I know northern lakes feel the same about our youth ministry. So it's ironic isn't it but they they're really struggling to have any sort of youth ministry where we've got you know 60 kids you know 10 age kids coming along and so it's not it's not in it's not in poverty by anyway but what do you got here you've got about 300 yeah so so anyone that comes to school down this way feels that pull over here but anyway so and we've just got to keep managing those sort of you know you know you know you're going to get a lot of money.

[29:21]
So we're just doing those sort of yeah we do have an impact on one another yeah so now good relationships is easy and I love it yeah it's terrific yeah I'm back. So establishing a different DNA this is something this is something that you know I think is a real challenge the bottom line is you your DNA is partly formed around the people who come and the people in whom you're minus

[30:04]
you at the same time you are you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are the one you are

[30:34]
But in the whole central coast, there are working class people, but the professional, aspirational central coast all sucks down towards the arena, the match-room, the beaches, all that sort of stuff. So we've got quite a different demographic in our church and that is reflected in our ministry. So, I don't think it's been too much of a struggle because they live there anyway.

[31:10]
So this is the area in which they live. So some people want to move up the social ladder, but most people are actually quite settled with who they are, where they're at and the suburbs in which they're living. And like that it's different and not in a competitive sort of way. So I think the DNA is formed around the suburbs and the people that come. Paul. I've been thinking of asking Andrew that today.

[31:58]
And that is, if he was doing the lakes today, would it be a campus of EV? I don't know the answer. So I think that they've moved on in terms of their model of church and when they planted down here in Woy-Woy, they've gone to campus model. So I don't know what they would have done. But I'd like to know. Yeah, yeah. So there's a range of questions there that I'm not certain about.

[32:33]
Well, not in the way we were thinking about church planting 10 or 11 years ago. And so the campus model was just, we thought that was weird 11 years ago. And we thought it was these controlling people trying to keep everything to themselves. Why wouldn't you just start a new work down there?

[33:04]
And so, but I can see what EV are doing. I think it's fantastic and it makes the sharing of resources that are allowed. So there's good things. So. Yeah, that's right. Yeah, so it's in quite a different space. Yeah. Yeah. So let's get Andrew in here and answer some of these questions. Yeah. So there's no connections between the churches in terms of constitutionally.

[33:50]
We have very similar constitution. We just borrowed theirs and tweaked it. And I didn't do that. We had this QC that was working behind the scenes and he did a great job. So we are completely independent church, but we are in very good fellowship. And it's, I think it's a really healthy relationship. So there's no formal obligation of relationship, but we just get along really well and we have such a similar philosophy of ministry and we do lots of stuff together.

[34:23]
Yeah. So Andrew is the president on the secretary and being so close works really well. So it's an Australian wide denomination FAC, but it works really well for us to have that sort of close connection. Yeah. So on Tuesday we ran a pastor's conference, Don Carson was here, so he said, and we ran it for the churches of the central coast and we're trying to sort of have biblical ministry

[34:59]
at the centre or, you know, we're trying to encourage the other churches and putting the Bible in the centre. Yeah. Okay. Do you come down to the stuff that you all need out of the book? No. No, there's no, there's no, in the early days there was a book reading group. I used to come down to that once a month, once every six weeks. And what I'm doing more and more now is trying to, EVA has evolved enormously in the last three years. And what I'm doing now is trying to get staff from our church actually connecting up with

[35:31]
the corresponding staff at EVA and say, these guys have thought about it much more than you. Come on. And they're forming those relationships and that's really good. Yeah. So yeah. Yeah. It was purely geographic, completely geographic, but we said we don't want you just to start

[36:08]
a new work because it's more convenient. So we instilled in them a mission focus, but we were trying to be missionally focused. And so we, it made sense in terms of, it was an obvious seam that we could just tear the two churches apart. And here's a group that lived there. Let's teach them to be missionally up in that area. Yeah. So it's quite different from when with EV I came up and started trying to gather people

[36:50]
to me, whereas with Northern Lakes, it was partly because I felt like, you know, maybe that could have been more could have been done there. But with Northern Lakes, I gathered a group. We had our heart set on this happening and we then found a pastor that could run with that group. So we sort of did a marriage. Yeah. Stuart. I'm not talking about the fact that you celebrated the whole plan to do it. Yeah. So that doesn't part of what you've been talking about in the Lakes church or the

[37:24]
Lord. Yeah. And so that was a church up in Northern Lakes. We'd even named 2006 as the date we'd like to do it. And so that was another reason for celebration because we felt like, wow, we actually, because two years out, we didn't, it was, it looked like it was going to be hard. But we were really excited when that happened. Yep. You might have already heard that. And you know, you didn't have to. Just being back to the very earliest names when you were here with you.

[37:56]
I think that the first time, you know, the second visit and what was it that you were like, was that for the Andrew and you that or that? You were like, no. No, it was me. It was me completely. Yeah. No, Andrew had nothing to do with that except we'd talk every now and then very rarely. And so what happened was I, I, I came and preached here once about a year earlier. And I said, look, and, and, and I was interviewed beforehand.

[38:26]
I said, this is what we're planning to do. And anyone who was interested could come and talk to me. I then preached about six months later. And that was the only platform I had at EV church. Couple of preaching spots. I wasn't regularly a tent. I wasn't attending EV. So a couple of preaching spots. And a sense that people knew me and, and got to know about this thing. And we're excited about this church that was going to happen. But then from that six months out, I met up with that group every month and talked about the different M's.

[38:58]
And so I did a study on each of the M's each month. And we talked about what that might look like in, in the new area where we were going. So I actually think there's something really, I think there's something helpful about me not being part of EV before he started. I think I see a danger when someone, I don't think it, I'm not saying it shouldn't happen, but it's more complicated when say someone from EV is sent to plan a church up at the lakes area.

[39:33]
Because so much more potential for influence and expectation. I know all these people I can grab them all. Whereas I was a step removed. Anyway. I see situations of grief where someone's come out of a church and started the church 20 minutes down the road. Expecting that they'll just take all their mates and stuff with them. And then there's a whole lot of fallout, relationally much more than we ever had.

[40:03]
Yeah. Well, let me, no, we're not. But let me tell you about another church. And what I've called it is another church plant. And this is where I need to actually turn the microphone. I'll say. What I've done is I can't just a number of people in terms of in mother daughter church relationships.

[40:34]
And so I thought I'd just hand that out for you. And I'll talk through some of the comments that these guys have come up with. So, yeah.

[41:11]
So, yeah. The campus style versus the completely independent work. At the moment, my thinking on that is largely geographical driven. So I can see how EV, it's 15 minutes drive to boy boy. And there's nowhere else beyond boy boy. I can see how that can work. Maybe in time they'll decide it needs to be its own entity completely. And I think they've got, they've got the door open to possibilities, I think.

[41:44]
We're 20 minutes where we could have been a campus of EV if things had been different. But I don't think northern lakes, I think it would have been a real stretch for northern lakes to be a campus of EV. And that's about as far as you want to go, isn't it? I just think geographically there are limitations on the campus model. That's my opinion of it. Now, but it could be interesting in 10 years time we could be thinking differently about it.

[42:16]
When you're talking about the strategy takes in three hundred years. Yeah. It's a bit easier because it's hard for EV to do really quite the likes. Well, that's the reason it's getting into this boy unit. How about that? The whole strategy worked in the end of ten years at point. Well, EV, we couldn't have started the lakes without EV.

[42:50]
So we are completely, I wasn't going down the same model as Andrew did. He just arrived, few mates, and a sense that there are people here who might gather into this sort of church. I didn't do that at the lakes and it would have been real hard going, I think, for me to do that. So the impetus for the start of our church whilst it was my initiative was thoroughly dependent on EV. And it was very consistent with the vision of EV. And I see the possibilities, like the scale of church that EV is now, they have possibilities not only for impacting the central coast but Australia.

[43:31]
I'm thoroughly behind the sort of philosophy that Andrew was talking about in the last session. And scaleability of this saying, we need not only lots of churches, but we need to create the capacity for big churches. And we are totally over meeting in a school hall. Ten years in, it's just, we're done in on the whole school hall. And when you get to the, we're 400 average on a Sunday, kids and adults.

[44:04]
To run that sort of church, you need a certain amount of professionalism up front. That's a word that people would laugh at in our church because it's sort of, there's only so much you can do in a school hall without totally exhausting people with the setup. But we want to keep making it better quality, the presentation, but it's really onerous. The more you add, the more you have to pack down. And so I can see why you want to move towards your own building and a bigger scale of doing things.

[44:38]
So I think you've just got to keep doing both. And yeah, yeah. Is anyone overseeing the whole strategy that's in proposed or is it just everyone having a philosophy of what's final judges and those on the floor? Yeah, we're just, yeah, there's no, not that I know. Maybe Andrew has got a, you know, an overall strategy. So, but I reckon the time is coming when we're going to, we've bought a block of land here.

[45:10]
I reckon a church plant here in five years time. And I reckon here could even be sooner in the whole Gospels, Narara Valley. I think there's a couple of obvious possibilities. Yeah, and so we need to start talking about that a little bit more. 20 minutes, 20 minutes. Yeah. And there's natural barriers between. So this is a mountain range that really just blocks it off and the lake.

[45:43]
And so it's sort of separate sort of areas. Let me just tell you something. So I just emailed a number of blocs who are in this sort of sphere of church planning. And there's some great advice I got. It's really good. I think this is the start of what could be a really helpful sort of working document. So Paul Harrington in Adelaide, who's an Anglican minister there and planted many churches. He says, just let me run through these very briefly.

[46:16]
Spend plenty of time preparing well both the Mother Church and the daughter team. When the Mother Church sends people it takes a hit. So if you're a person who's a lot of people with get up and go, get up and go. This can leave the sending church with a sense of grief, all our friends have gone. Mother Church is need to train well in advance of sending. Given you are keen to send good people to plant, you need to train up those who are going to step into ministry after them. So the sense of it doesn't, don't just wait till it hits.

[46:48]
But instead of start preparing for it, we did that with northern lakes. It's clear that about the arrangement between the Mother daughter, when everyone is passionately doing ministry, the fights will often be about autonomy finance. And everyone who I wrote to basically, that was their message, be clear on expectations and communication. It came again and again and again. Mother Church is a keen to have an ongoing interest in the daughter church, but this isn't likely to be reciprocated. The energy and interest is with the new enterprise.

[47:21]
It's interesting, all the Mother Church guys that I contacted, you can see that they are grieving over this. It's like bleeding. And that is the Mother Church invests a lot of affection towards the daughter church. The daughter church is almost like oblivious that the Mother Church even exists. That's right, that's life, isn't it? So it's a helpful analogy that Mother daughter set a situation, because it is, the Mother does carry a lot of responsibility that the daughter never realises.

[47:56]
Until she grows up and has a daughter. After a time, daughter churches grow up. There is a need for a model of planning, where the relationship changes over time to allow for teenage need for room to move. But see, what they have done in Adelaide is it is a tight network. So they are not independent works. They are all under the circumstances, basically, like the sort of thing that EV is doing at this stage.

[48:27]
In terms of advice to the, does it say, oh, I have no idea what the state is there. Sorry guys, it should say advice to the daughter church on the right hand side. Is that consistently bad? Okay, all right. Okay, thanks for that. So advice to the daughter church, spend plenty of time developing the core team that is going to plant, you know, pray together, read the Bible together, so on. Cultivate thankfulness is the next point for your mother and an ongoing mutual respect.

[48:57]
You can see it's a mother church writing this, can't you? Cultivate thankfulness for your mother and ongoing mutual respect. Next point, be self aware when building your team. If the lead planter is a great evangelist and allows you organize it, say you've just got to gather people who compliment your weaknesses. The mother leaders and daughter leaders and sing a letter of each should meet and pray regularly. They should work to encourage one another in the gospel. And I think that's a really, really healthy principle.

[49:28]
Let me go on. Oh, this is great because this Scott McKenzie was church planner of single and evangelical. And these guys are in our network and Roger Burgess was the pastor of MATLAND evangelical. Who in a sense came on as the second lead pastor of that church when single to evangelical was already the momentum was already happening. And so he inherited this church plant in its infancy.

[49:58]
And really interesting dynamics that created so advice to the mother church. He says this is Scott the daughter church is saying have realistic expectations and plans for how the daughter church will mature. Make sure these are communicated clearly. Work at the understanding the culture that the daughter church is in. So different type of situation communicate to the congregation of the importance and value of the daughter church often. So I find this amazing.

[50:31]
Expect tension and conflict. Now it's fascinating like these guys if you met Roger or if you met Scott you would think these are the most easygoing guys. But you can see that they have been through pain in relationship together. And it's just part of the character of grappling with gospel ambition and selfish ambition and all that sort of stuff. It's a complex mix.

[51:02]
So he's advised to the daughter church keep the communication channels open, be proactive and give them the mother church an ongoing real picture. Be mindful that what the mother church does can sometimes feel as if it's taking over. Because the mother church is bigger it can sometimes feel as though the daughter church is insignificant. So they've still got quite a tight connection these two churches and they're financially dependent. Singled and still financially dependent on mainland at the moment.

[51:33]
And how far are you in Chris? How far is your church being going? How long? So yeah singled and four years old as well. Same time you guys started. Okay there's his Roger's comment. So I'll just pick up on a few of them. He talks about communicating. Fourth one down I like this. Don't be defensive. Remember that God has justified you freely through Christ's death. You don't have to prove yourself to God or to anyone else.

[52:03]
Rest easy in the truth of justification by faith alone. How helpful is that? Because your identity is not in this church plant. Your identity is in Christ and Him justifying you. And he says exactly the same if you look across to the right. Don't be defensive. Remember that God has justified you. So both for the daughter and the another church. And skip over to the last page. There's Rick Smith from Sydney Anglican scene.

[52:33]
Phil Campbell. I read Phil's in Andrews. Phil only gave me a short comment because he's been on holidays. But it's very interesting. He's the lead pastor of the mother church. Expect very little back from the daughter. Exhaaple. Set realistic expectations that new members of the plant will not be especially interested in connecting with home base. We'll be unlikely to attend any joint events. We'll show little appreciation of the history of sacrifice and financial investment.

[53:03]
And on the other side he says, educate the daughter church towards an appreciation of these factors for at least three to five years. So the mother church is feeling the pain. And if only the daughter would just show a bit of attention around that. What was the question that you were feeling about this? Oh yeah, about this thing today. Oh yeah, about that dynamic. And it's interesting what they do. That's an opportunity for the church. And that sort of move will begin to be a more meaningful and more important thing.

[53:34]
And it's an important thing to do. But it's just a way to do this. Yeah. Yeah. I'll back. Does anybody still have a canvas? There's a canvas for the mom. Yeah. And you know, if you're a student, you just love to see the whole thing. Yeah. That's what I'm saying. You have anyone who's a student. You can't have the green thing to see it. Yeah. Yeah.

[54:04]
See. Yeah. You can take a picture of the canvas for a long long amount of account. You too would work with it. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You will all imagine. Let's look at the last one. Andrew heard. Be clear, Mother Church. Be clear that you give everything. Advice to the daughter church. Be clear that you expect nothing. And that's, I think that's, that's the key bit of advice from all of them in a nutshell. And that it's all about expectations.

[54:35]
That if you as the Mother Church think we're going to give and it's going to hurt. But we're going to be generous. As the daughter church, you think I'm not going to assume we're going to get anything from the Mother Church. And anything we get will joyfully receive and be thankful for. And if you're both going with that attitude, then be fantastic. That's like with husband and wife. Sometimes you've got to get them in different rooms and say to the husband, you love your wife, self-sac. And the wife you say, you submit to your husband even if he's an idiot.

[55:06]
And so you've almost got to get them in different rooms. I think the same with the Mother-Daughter Church relationship. So the Mother Church needs to know that they will have to be generous. And it will be sacrificial and it will cost them the daughter church. Don't expect anything. And you won't be disappointed. I'm afraid you're thinking about it too. How many of you have suffered when you were in the hospital? We had one year. Yeah. But that was because our area is quite unique.

[55:40]
The proximity of the central coast to Sydney ought not to be underestimated. So the fact that Sydney has such a thriving evangelical network that is not found particularly in the Anglican churches up here. So people that move up here are looking often looking for an evangelical home. And so I think once we've never slipped below 60 adults average on a Sunday.

[56:12]
And that was in our first year. And by the end of that year we're averaging about 100 adults on a Sunday. But it's partly the really good start we had from EV and partly just that when I talked about that, that quite a big area of catchment anyone even looking for an evangelical ministry was coming to us because there wasn't anyone offering anything to like it.

[56:43]
Yeah. Yeah. So if I was doing while, I would do it as campus. And that's probably how I do here as well. Yeah. Because because I think at least in the early days, I don't think they could be financially self-sufficient. I think, I think it's those things are still being worked out. And I think it seems to me that they are under review as things develop and as we understand more about how the campus model works.

[57:21]
So yeah, Paul. I think it's a very good question and do you think people are turning to the campus model because I think I've been through all the reviews and for the past. You talk about the mother having all these first people, but turning to that model is the main thing to grow and have a relationship with the label. Well, you're certainly wouldn't want that to be the case.

[57:53]
Would you? So you wouldn't want people turning, I'm just repeating for the same. You wouldn't want people to be turning to the campus model to minimise grief and to maximise control. Whether that's the reality. It's exactly the same as gospel ambition versus selfish ambition. We've all got a mixture of both and we're just going to keep purifying our might as along the way.

[58:23]
So yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So we've been working on one of the last things we've been doing in the framework that I'm not sure if it's been used to be for the most grateful or grateful. At the moment, I'm sure it's actually an archival framework and we have yet to think that we're actually making it the best of the time. Yeah. I can speak into that.

[58:55]
When you start a church, the difference between our church on the early days in EV was massive. And it just felt like going to church felt like a bit of a downer in comparison. I don't think the same would be there as much as acutely for the campus down south because they've got the resources of a music magnification pastor. And they've got the resources of great preaching and just the kids ministry and what's that?

[59:28]
So the idea of a campus is where it's not on the same site. So it's 20 minutes down the road, but it's completely under that responsibility and umbrella of the mother church. And so the mother church is totally responsible for everything that goes on. There's no independence between them. Talking extremes. Oh, no, no, no.

[1:00:00]
So the way EV do it is they have a preacher might do the Saturday night church here and then go and do Sunday morning there. And so on any given Sunday you will have two or three people preparing a sermon on the same passage, but rolling it out in six contexts. In at boy, boy, there is Greg, Greg Masters is studying theology at the moment and leading that church.

[1:00:34]
I don't even know what time we're going to. We can go five thirty. Yeah, okay. But are we all feeling done? Yeah, a couple more questions. Stuart, start. Talk to the six forest. Are there other more than 10 for you? If you can talk really thrust tax, can we give you the pictures and the building lights to start all? I think it was about thirty adults.

[1:01:06]
Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, they started with a bigger congregation than thirty adults, but thirty was how many went from the lakes. And in terms of support for the past, do you think you've got a few seconds to move? Yeah, I can't recall whether we did that for more than one year. But basically we had a model where once the church becomes self-sufficient, step back,

[1:01:37]
and it was either a year or maybe two years with the case of Northern Lakes. But yeah, one of the things about starting a completely independent work is I do think it is easier to raise money from outside for it. So I think EV would have a hard job going to, you know, friends and family beyond central coast and saying, we're starting a campus of EV, we want you to give sacrificiale towards it. But, you know, me starting the lakes, it's an independent church, will you give towards it?

[1:02:12]
So the generosity of the church that I'd mean it was overwhelming, someone gave $50,000, a one-off gift. And then we, so in total we were the beneficiaries of about $100,000. So our budget was about $100,000. And so that enabled us to employ the second long-term work really quickly. And really gave us a great start. I'm going to finish up, but just, I think I've got another picture there.

[1:02:43]
What have I got? Oh, these are a block of land, so there you go. We've got a big billboard, but nothing else. There was already a real estate billboard there, so we just put our own thing there. So that's nice, isn't it? But the next one, this has not got to do with mother, not got to do with mother daughter church at all. But I just think it's helpful reflection on church planting is that often I think in, you know, Christian world, sometimes the church planting, you know, the church plant can be seen as the glory boy, you know, the Usain Bolt, you know, and the rock star of the, you know,

[1:03:21]
like so any, the Olympics, the sprinters are the ones who strut around the village in there. But I reckon this is a better model for church plantar. And this guy, I can't remember what Olympics it was, Mexico Olympics, yeah. And he came in, the marathon had been over for hours already. And this guy was coming last by a long way. He's bleeding on the leg, he's got bandages around his leg. And he just sort of hobbles in and there was a few spectators that actually stayed on.

[1:03:53]
And finally crossed the line, you know, and got a cheer. And the interviewer said, why did you keep going? You know, it was pretty clear that you couldn't win the race. So what kept you going? You know, through the pain and all that stuff. And he said, my country didn't send me here to stop the marathon. They sent me here to finish. I just think it's a fantastic illustration. But that's what I see with the Apostle Paul is he recognized that it's not about his glory.

[1:04:26]
It was about the glory of Christ. And he talked about himself as this clay jar, you know, this where breaking down, persecuted, you know, beaten about on all sides. But what that does is it shows forth even more the glory of God and his gospel. So I'm going to let us in prayers and finish. It's great. Got our father. Yeah, we do thank you that you've given us a real heart for your kingdom.

[1:04:56]
But we know that in a midst that gospel ambition, there is also selfish ambition. And father sometimes we're even blind to it ourselves. Father sometimes we're much better at seeing it in others than we are in recognising ourselves. So father, we pray that just we will have great integrity and that your word will continue to minister to us by your spirit. You'll continue to convict us of sin and lead us to repentance and help us to trust you and our our standing before you not through anything we do.

[1:05:35]
But through the work of Christ, please help us to be generous, to count the cost of following Jesus and to to want to invest in the work of the gospel, to give our lives to it, and to be willing to free up resources to see that happening, even if it might impact ministry in our own place. We pray that we'll have a bigger perspective and want to see one of the generous towards ministry in other places, but also want to be generous in our assumptions we make about others.

[1:06:13]
So father, we pray for everyone here in whatever sort of relationship of church they're in. We do pray that you will use us for your kingdom. Give us that gospel hardness that the apostle Paul had. And father, we pray that you will use us mightily for your kingdom. We pray to Jesus now. I'm in.